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Agnes Ethelwyn Wetherald (1857-1940)
{Compiled by “S”}
In 1834 John Wetherald, a quaker, moved his family to Canada. He purchased a hundred acre farm near Guelph Ontario.
One son William was born in Healaugh, England on September 28, 1820. He attended Ackworth, one of the leading Quaker schools in England. He came to Canada and worked on the farm. Later he worked as a teacher. At age 23 he taught school in Ermosa Township. He was a gifted teacher.
In 1846 William Wetherald married Jemima Harris Balls born March 3, 1830 near Rockwood.
In 1851 William Wetherald started a boarding school for boys. It was called Rockwood Academy
Rockwood Academy: It housed up to fifty boys. The boys were ages 12-16. The main floor of the academy had a library, classroom, living room. The dining facilities were in the basement with a kitchen at the back. Upstairs the Wetherald family had five bedrooms and rooms for teaching assistants. The third floor was dormitory rooms for students.
The school was solid. English, math and latin were taught. Expenses were low, twenty –one dollars for tuition and board for a term of three months. Most of the texts were furnished to the students.
Mr Wetherald was a gifted teacher and revelled in the poets and was close to his students.
Many of his students were accomplished, many became doctors, teachers, business men, ministry. J.J. Hill became a railway magnet, Premier A.S. Hardy, I.E. Bowman was leading educator of Waterloo, Alexander Campbell Public School Inspector of Bruce County.and Sir Adam Beck of Hydro.
In 1864 William Wetherald sold Rockwood Academy and by 1884 it closed.
The movie Agnes of God was filmed at the Rockwood Academy.
William Wetherald accepted a position at Haverford College in Philadelphia, moved his family there and stayed there until 1866. He resigned and moved to a farm in Pelham, Ontario. It was located the corner of Foss Road and Cream Street. He was welcomed by the Quaker community. William became the ordained minister at the Quaker church on Haist Street, Fonthill.
In May 1898 William went to England to attend an annual meeting of the Friends and spent several months in England. He was strickened with pneumonia and died there. He died in Banbury England in his 78th year.
His Son Herbert inherited the farm. William Jr and Agnes Ethelwyn lived there until their deaths.
Agnes Ethelwyn Wetherald was born April 26, 1857 in Rockwood. Her parents were William and Jemima Wetherald. She was the 6th of eleven children.
She was a serious, lonely, frail child. She immersed herself in books. She was five feet five inches tall, slight stature, gentle unselfish person with an indomitable spirit.
When the family moved to Pelham, a Quaker family in Buffalo offered to educate one of William’s daughters, Agnes was chosen. She attended Union Springs school in New York and Pickering College in Ontario.
Her father believed women should have as good an education as men.
At age 17 Agnes received her first cheque for a poem that was published in “St Nicholas”. Starting in 1887 she contributed articles to Toronto Globe, also wrote regular columns for that paper.
Much of Ethelwyn’s work was done in her “Camp Shelbi” a large tree house built in the limbs of a willow tree at the Pelham Farm. It was built March 1910.
Ethelwyn enjoyed politics and economics from both countries where she was educated.
Her first experience as a free lance writer, she was living with her 2 brothers in St Pail, Minnesota. She spent the summer at the lake , wrote about it and took it to the paper and was told it was a human interest story. It was published and she earned four dollars.
In the late 1930s Ethelwyn contributed to a column in the Welland Tribune. It was a children’s column written by Mrs S. McInnis using the pen name Patty Perkins. Ethelwyn used the pen name Octo, referring to the fact she was an octogenarian.
In 1938 July 16 Ethelwyn had a party. It was hosted by Louis Blake Duff at his home in St. John’s.
In 1911 at the age of 54 Ethelwyn employed a woman named Mary who had a child. Ethelwyn adopted the child and named her Dorothy. Ethelwyn never married.
Agnes Ethelwyn Wetherald died March 10, 1940. At the time of her death much of her book collection was donated to the Rockwood Academy Collection at the University of Guelph.
- Some of Agnes Ethelwyn Wetherald’s works:
The House of the Trees and other Poems, 1895
Tangled in Stars, 1902
The Radiant Road, 1902
The Last Robin; lyrics and Sonnets, 1907
Tree Top Mornings, 1921
Lyrics and Sonnets, 1931
An Algonquin Maiden: A Romance of the Early Days of Upper Canada with Graeme Mercer Adam, 1887
The Garden of the Heart: A Garland of verses by Ethelwyn Wetherald and others, 1903.
The esteemed rector of Holy Trinity Church, Welland, was born at Edenton, North Carolina, in 1843. He was educated at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill where he graduated in 1861. He served under Gen. Stonewall Jackson in the American Civil War and out of 150 who volunteered with him only 18 survived. He was through seventeen of the bloodiest battles of Virginia. After the war he studied law for two years and then devoted himself to the ministry. He was ordained at Oswego, New York, in 1870. Seven years later he came to Canada and studied at Trinity University taking a post graduate course and securing the degrees of M.A. and Bachelor of Divinity. His first Canadian appointment was at Jarvis. He accepted the rectorship of Holy Trinity church in 1889, today holding the love, respect and admiration of its members. In 1891 he went to England in the service of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel and gave lectures in the leading cities of England. He was invited by the society to make a similar tour of Italy and was subsequently pressed to give another series of lectures in England, but both these offers he was forced to refuse owing to the demands of his work at home. He was made a Doctor of Divinity by the University of North Carolina and was notified by the secretary of the Episcopal Convention of that state that his name had been officially proposed as co-adjutor bishop. Despite his long absence he came within one vote of being elected to the position. Dr. Johnstone is chaplain of the 44th Regiment and holds a deserved popularity with the officers and men. During the formation of the Canadian contingents for the South African campaign he volunteered three times to enlist in any capacity in which he could serve the flag and relative to this he has a number of interesting letters from Colonel Otter, Sir Frederick Bordon and Lord Lansdowne.
Was born in Hay Township, Huron County, on July 19, 1859, the son of John Gross, who is still living at the age of 80 years. His grandfather, Jacob Gross, was a German, and settled in Lincoln County in 1818. Mr. Gross studied law with W, M. German, M.P. and in 1897 was called to the bar. As a Liberal standard bearer he twice carried Welland County, being elected in 1900 and 1902. Mr. Gross is a member of the English Church. - [Welland Telegraph 1904/05]
Was born in Stamford Township on April 4th, 1853. In Stamford he got his public school training. He was a student for a time at the Drummondville Grammar school and later attended a preparatory college at Birmingham, Mich. Matriculating at Ann Arbor University in 1875, he returned to Ontario to adopt teaching as a profession. His professional certificate was obtained at Toronto Normal School. His first school was in Crowland where he remained a year. He was next three years at Southend, and nineteen years principal of Ridgeway school. During these years he devoted much time to the study of entomology in which branch of natural science he has obtained a wide recognition as an authority. In 1891 he succeeded the late Col. James E. Morin as Clerk of Bertie. He has been a director and treasurer of Bertie Natural Gas Company since its organization in 1901. He was appointed secretary-treasurer of the Bertie and Willoughby Farmers’ Mutual Fire Insurance Company in 1902 on the resignation of the late Henry N. Hibbard. Mr. Kilman is an ardent Liberal and at the last election declined nomination for the local legislature.